The British DJ who played a dance remix of the Muslim call to prayer has been sentenced to a year in jail by a Tunisian court.
The London-born Dax J was charged with public indecency and offending public morality, the BBC reports.
The DJ had already fled the country before the court case. He had also issued an apology.
Footage of the weekend’s event showing clubbers dancing in the nightclub Dax J played the song had been shared on social media causing a widespread outrage.
The court dismissed charges against the nightclub owner and the organizer of Orbit Festival in Nabeul in Tunisia’s north-east, but the prosecution has appealed saying the two should have checked what the DJ would be playing, a court spokesperson told AFP news agency.
“We will not allow attacks against religious feelings and the sacred,” the governor of Nabeul, Mnaouar Ouertani, said when the club was shut down.
Organizers of the event apologized earlier in the week in a post on the event’s Facebook page, but said that they did not accept responsibility for the playing of any offensive music.
The post said, the DJ “did not realize it might offend an audience from a Muslim country like ours.”
Dax J has offered his “sincere apologies to anyone who may have been offended by music that I played at Orbit Festival in Tunisia on Friday”.
“It was never my intention to upset or cause offence to anybody,” he said.
Dax J is a renowned DJ who has performed at festivals and nightclubs around the world including techno festival Awakenings in Holland and the UK’s Glastonbury.
